Not long after Apple’s iOS 6 software update was officially released to the public, I earlier wrote some thoughts on ‘Passbook‘; one of my favourite new features in iOS 6 with plenty of potential.

Since then, the number of applications and companies have slowly increased. Just a quick look through AppShopper reveals applications with passbook support added, as well as companies like Qantas and Virgin Australia offering passes via their mobile web checkins (again demonstrating that you don’t need to have an app to support Passbook!) and Ticketek and Moshtix supporting Passbook for events.

The first application to be approved and actively promoted by Apple for having Passbook support was Nova’s ‘ShopperNova‘ app – essentially a directory of coupons and other special offers. While the offers here could be added to Passbook, they weren’t taking complete advantage of all the features – using generic barcodes with just a ‘coupon code’ to be used online, or to confuse staff if you dared to try and use it at a brick and mortar location (looking at you Oporto and SuperDry).

One of maybe the most underhyped (or even overhyped) and hopefully my favourite new feature of Apple’s iOS 6 would have to be Passbook.
Perhaps a not so direct competitor to Google Wallet, in that it doesn’t handle mobile payments (yet), Passbook is yet another app that wants to replace your wallet.

Your boarding passes, movie tickets, retail coupons, loyalty cards, and more are now all in one place.

Of course, much like anything that relies on third parties – unfortunately those third parties have to also get on board. I believe that Passbook has the potential to become quite large. Surely I can’t be the only one who hates carrying around physical cards in my wallet, digging around for those loyalty cards hidden in there somewhere. Or, printing out those PDF tickets to that event, because you couldn’t remember where you put them last time you hit print. Passbook wants to help you here.

One of the coolest (and hence, most hyped) uses of NFC would have to be the use of it for contactless payments.Just like your MasterCard or Visa card with PayPass or payWave.

The most widely known example of using your phone as your wallet is probably Google’s Wallet app. After installing it on your Android phone, you’re all set to tap away.

But the problem with Google Wallet is that Google wants to control the whole experience, so you can only install it officially on a handful of devices, has only integrated tightly with Citibank, and so only a handful of customers can actually use Google Wallet.

Thanks to the internet however, it’s possible to shoehorn Google Wallet on to devices that aren’t ‘technically’ supported and tap away.

Since grabbing my Galaxy Nexus, Wallet was one of the most exciting things I was looking forward to trying, and surprisingly getting it going wasn’t much effort at all.